Turbine On Tolkien

18 Nov 2008 at 16:33:02 by Andy Alderson

Turbine's Jeffrey Steefel has said the relationship between the developer and the Tolkien Estate has "changed" since work began on Lord of the Rings Online.

Speaking exclusively to IncGamers, Steefel said there was a degree of uncertainty between the two parties when the LOTRO project was first announced.

"I think it’s changed. When we first started working on the project before launch, they were more concerned and we were more concerned about making sure they were involved in as many steps as possible," said Steefel.

"They didn’t have any idea of our understanding of the lore and how we were going to treat it and we didn’t know how sensitive they were going to be."

However, Steefel went on to stress how the working relationship is now much different.

"At this point, they really trust that we find the integrity of the world as valuable as they do and we have pretty good idea about where they’re willing to bend because this is a game first," he added.

"They don’t go everything we do, pixel by pixel, word by word. It would be impossible. But when we deal with anything majorly iconic, we need their input ... If we’re inventing anything significant that isn’t in the book at all then we definitely spend time with them. We certainly make changes based on their suggestions but they are pretty minor at this point."

Click here for the full interview.

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